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Land lease request indicates MCAS move delay

Date Posted: 2001-08-22

The Naha Defense Facilities Administration Agency has applied for a compulsory expropriation of a plot of a land in the Naha Military Port and another within MCAS Futenma. In both cases the landowners were refusing to rent the land totaling 1.27 hectares.

The requested duration of the forced lease is ten year, implying that the government admits for the first time that it is impossible to relocate the facilities of MCAS Futenma within the period designated in the SACO agreement. The original agreement said that the MCAS Futenma would be relocated within five to seven years from the signing of the agreement in 1996. Observes say that the request implies that the government predicts it takes at least another ten years until the relocation is complete.